Alzheimer dementia is a kind of dementia with a deterioration of cognitive function and personality change as main symptoms. Alzheimer dementia is commonly known as Alzheimer's disease.
In patients with Alzheimer's disease, since presynaptic terminals of the cholinergic nervous system have been modified and neural transmission does not sufficiently function, dementia conceivably develops.
In the presynaptic terminals, there are vesicles that store acetylcholine, which is released by nerve stimulation. For taking acetylcholine into the vesicles, vesicular transporters (vesicular acetylcholine transporter) are present on the vesicle membrane. The acetylcholine vesicular transporters are considered to be involved in Alzheimer's disease. If the vesicular acetylcholine transporters can be evaluated, not only diagnosis of Alzheimer's disease but also elucidation of mechanism underlying Alzheimer's disease and development of pharmaceutical products can be realized.
As a compound capable of evaluating the vesicular acetylcholine transporters, for example, a vesamicol piperazine derivative described in Patent Literature 1 is mentioned.